NOMINATIONS for COMMITTEE POSITIONS: Financial members of SPA may nominate for any committee position, President, Vice President, Treasurer, Secretary or committee member Please email before 28th September to victas@population.org.au or write to: RETURNING OFFICER , SUSTAINABLE POPULATION AUSTRALIA, Victorian and Tasmanian branch, P.O.BOX 556 Hawthorn 3122 to arrive before Friday September 28th

Following the formal proceedings, you are invited to our public seminar

“What does the Australian public really think about a Big Australia and what do the media try to make them think?”

Presenters:

Dr. Katharine Betts, Adjunct Associate Professor of Sociology, Swinburne University, Author of “The Great Divide: immigration politics in Australia”, and researcher for The Australian Population Research Institute. Dr. Betts will present her research into attitudes of the Australian public towards Australia’s current high immigration- driven population growth.

Ian Penrose, Melbourne’s first Yarra Riverkeeper, City of Melbourne 2010 Environmental Award winner, Boroondara citizen of of the year 2015, long term campaigner for population stabilization. Mr.Penrose will present his recent research into the way the media in Australia frames the population issue.

President Message eNews September #2 2018

I was talking with our NSW Branch President, Graham Wood, who was expressing despair about a friend of his who was totally dismissive of the concerns that SPA has about the sort of future we face if governments around the world do not address the population issue. He read out to me what he had written in the small hours of the morning in response to that uninformed and dismissive attitude, and he has agreed to share it with you.

The Great Regionalisation Distraction:
Sending migrants to the regions no solution to population growth, says SPA

Sending new migrants to the regions, as the new Population Minister, Alan Tudge, suggests is just ‘tinkering around the edges’ in dealing with Australia’s population growth problems, according to Sustainable Population Australia (SPA).

SPA national president Sandra Kanck says current net overseas migration (NOM) is simply too large, no matter where migrants go.

The Victorian branch of Sustainable Population Australia (SPA) expresses deep concern that Australia will reach 25 million people by mid August. In anticipation of this milestone, SPA literally took to the sky on the issue by flying a small plane over Melbourne to see first hand whether bigger means better.

In 2010, The Australian Conservation Foundation nominated human population growth as a key threat to biodiversity in Australia.

Their submission outlines areas where the pressure is greatest. For example: In 2005, 60% of Australia’s coastal councils had an annual population growth rate greater than 3%, or at least twice the national average.

Now in 2018, what's changed? Not much. Australia's population is still marching on at a rate that puts us among fastest growing nations in the OECD. Meanwhile we've seen more sensitive habitat squashed by development.

Sustainable Population Australia (SPA) has expressed concern that Australia has all but reached 25 million people and has done so too quickly. It strongly advocates that policies should be put into immediate effect whereby Australia’s rate of population growth slows and stabilises at the earliest opportunity.

SPA’s national president Ms Sandra Kanck says Australia’s population ballooned more quickly than most other developed countries.